The European
Commission has put new pressure on Cyprus in a bid to meet Turkish
demands for quicker integration into the Brussels lawmaking machine.

After convincing
Nicosia earlier this year to soften its opposition to Ankara’s EU
membership bid in order to secure a deal with Turkey on stemming the
flow of refugees into Europe, the Commission is now reviving
long-frozen Turkish requests for participation in European
rule-making bodies on issues such as maritime safety and industrial
standards certification.

Diplomats said
Cypriots have raised objections in several EU meetings over the last
two months to the Commission’s efforts, which could lead to Turkish
officials having input on European policy even though it is not an EU
member.

The
behind-the-scenes push is part of what many see as an effort by
Brussels to appease Turkey in order to keep the fragile deal on
migration in place. In addition to a promise to move forward on
Turkey’s application for EU membership, the agreement includes
controversial plans to grant visa-free travel in Europe for Turkish
citizens. Critics have complained that the Commission is pushing
aside concerns about the Turkish government’s authoritarian rule.

Nicosia is also
concerned that the push reflects a weakening of support in the
Commission for Cyprus’ bid to normalize relations with Turkey.
Ankara refuses to recognize the EU country and has maintained trade
sanctions against it since the 1980s. This means Cypriot aircraft
cannot enter Turkish airspace and commercial vessels with a Cypriot
link of any kind are banned from entering Turkish ports.

In protest over
Turkey’s trade embargo, Cyprus in 2009 blocked several areas of
negotiation on Turkey’s EU membership, known as “chapters.”
However, during a tense summit in March on the EU-Turkey migration
deal, Cyprus agreed to the opening of a new, uncontroversial chapter
— on the budget.

Turkey’s
membership of the Paris Memorandum has been on hold for the last
eight years, but the discussion was seen as boosting it.

Cypriot diplomats
said the Commission had agreed to Turkish demands to go further and
open one of the chapters blocked by Cyprus, which include energy,
justice and education. But the Cypriot government refused on the
grounds that Turkey “has not even made a gesture” towards
dismantling the trade embargo, according to the diplomats.

The Commission has
also riled Cyprus by reviving Turkish requests for inclusion in
decision-making bodies. These include Ankara’s long-frozen
application for EU recognition of Turkish Lloyd, a classification and
industrial certification society for shipping and industry that was
previously not considered to have met Europe’s high safety
criteria.

That request from
Turkey, as well as its stalled bid to join the Paris Memorandum of
Understanding, a shipping safety body, were discussed at an April
meeting of national governments chaired by the Commission’s
directorate-general for mobility and transport. Turkey’s membership
of the Paris Memorandum has been on hold for the last eight years,
but the discussion was seen as boosting it. Minutes of the meeting
show participants also discussed the potential “participation” of
Turkey in an EU agency, the European Maritime Safety Agency.

No official link
between the Turkish requests and the migrant deal was made at the
meeting, but the connection was nevertheless “obvious,” according
to a diplomat who attended. “Cyprus raised questions in a very
diplomatic way, without saying they were actually opposed,” the
diplomat said.

Commission transport
spokesman Jakub Adamowicz said the April meeting was part of a series
of “informal, non-binding exchanges of view.” Maja Kocijancic,
Commission spokeswoman for enlargement negotiations, said that
despite the decision to “reinvigorate” Turkey’s EU membership
talks, there had been “no change” in the executive’s support
for Cyprus.

The road to
membership

For Turkey,
integration into European decision-making is a natural step on the
road to EU membership. Non-EU members including Norway already sit on
the board of the European Maritime Safety Agency, while Montenegro,
another accession candidate, is on the path to membership of the
Paris Memorandum. Turkey already cooperates closely with the EU as
part of a customs union, thereby fulfilling some of the accession
criteria.

The Commission’s
promotion of Turkey’s interests puts Cyprus in a tight spot.
Nicosia has a veto on Turkey’s EU accession bid, but to stop
Ankara’s prior integration into the technical bodies it would need
allies.

The same applies to
visa liberalization. During a May meeting of EU interior ministers,
Cyprus’ Socrates Hasikos demanded Turkey meet all conditions,
including cooperation between justice authorities, Europol and the
Turkish police, before visa-free travel was granted.

“Cyprus is ready
to participate constructively in discussions on the liberalization of
visas for Turkish nationals only when they have fulfilled all the
criteria,” he said, according to a report by the Cyprus News
Agency. In reality, however, Cyprus has no veto over visa
liberalization because it is subject to qualified majority voting in
the Council of Ministers.

Cypriot politicians
have until now publicly refrained from accusations of abandonment by
Brussels.

The visa
liberalization issue has proved the real sticking point in the
survival of the EU-Turkey migration deal; the European Parliament has
insisted that Ankara meet all of the necessary criteria for obtaining
it, but Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has refused to budge
on one of the key provisions, a required change to the country’s
anti-terrorism legislation.

Cypriot politicians
have put on a brave face as the tide turns against them. They have
until now publicly refrained from accusations of abandonment by
Brussels. Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides said in early May there
was no link between visa-free travel for Turks and the “Cyprus
problem,” which dates back to a Turkish invasion and occupation of
around a third of the island in 1974.

Cyprus has more
chance of obtaining Turkish recognition with the Commission’s
support, but the tiny Mediterranean island packs a small punch in
Brussels — as was evident when its concerns were largely overruled
in the March summit when the EU-Turkey deal was approved.